Yesterday I wrote about my struggle with thinking my children and myself will be perfect. I have these standards in my head: THAT kid & THAT mom.
It’s one thing to realize I have these unrealistic expectations, but it’s another to stop expecting perfection.
I shared that one way to combat these thoughts is to see us as God sees us. To realize that He will give me the grace & ability to complete the calling He has given me. He has called me to be the mom of my kids…not THAT mom of THAT kid.
I had a reader ask me the following question on Facebook & I thought I would ask my blog readers their thoughts:
“I have such unrealistic expectations for myself, and my kids. How do i put those aside? How do I break the destructive patterns of thought? My solution is to hide His words in my heart, as much as I can. Any other suggestions?”
If you struggle with expecting perfection, how do you break that pattern of thought?
I thought I would also share a quote from Ann Voskamp’s “One Thousand Gifts” on her approach to changing her mindset:
“That heavy beat of failure, a pounding bass of disappointment, it has pulsed through my days and I’ve mouthed the words, singing it to myself, memorizing the ugly lines by heart. For years, I tried medication, blade, work, escape, all attempts to drown out that incessant, reverberating drum of self-rejection…the only thing to rip out the tape echoing of self-rejection is the song of His serenade. One thousand gifts tuned me to the beat. It is really like C.S. Lewis argued: that the most fundamental thing is not how we think of God but rather what God thinks of me…practicing eucharisteo was the very first I had really considered at length what God thought of me…He chooses His children to fully live! Fully live the fullest life: the astonished gratitude, the awed joy, the flying & the free.”
Ann’s solution to those unrealistic expectations & feelings of failure is to count God’s gifts. To see how deeply we are loved. To live fully right where we are…not trying to attain another life. To find joy in thanking God for what He has given us.
PLEASE share with our “God-centered mom” community your thoughts on this topic. Let’s help each other break out of the chains of perfection we have placed on ourselves.
As I read this post as well as the one on patience I was reflecting on something God taught me in relation to a passage on waiting on Him…I am very impatient and very hard on myself. I was wondering what exactly it means to wait on God and felt God giving me this lesson: So often I am frustrated because myself or one of my kids is not progressing as quickly in a given area as *I* believe we should be. In these frustrations I am not waiting on HIS timing. Perhaps He doesn’t want me or them to progress any further than we are at the moment. Perhaps we would be prideful or wouldn’t learn the lesson He has for us if we learned at MY pace. Maybe this is obvious to others but it was completely eye opening to me! I’m loving your blog, Heather!
Thanks Jen for sharing! So very, very true!